February 25, 2004
Miami (AP)–An expelled Haitian drug-lord claimed at his sentencing that embattled Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide controls 85% of the cocaine flow through the impoverished nation.
After bashing Haiti?s leader, Beaudouin Ketant was sentenced to 27 years in federal prison.
Ketant says he paid off Aristide for years. He and claims Aristide turned Haiti in a narco-country and controlled Haiti?s drug world.
An attorney for the Haitian government flatly dismissed the allegations and challenged Ketant to prove it.
The 40-year-old defendant also has been fined $15 million and ordered to forfeit another $15 million.
Prosecutors say he smuggled his way to a Midas-like fortune that included an $8 million villa, paintings by Monet and Picasso and bank accounts in Haiti and the Bahamas. A daughter at Emory University drives a Mercedes-Benz.